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this is the part that has always confused me.

after a natural disaster hits some distant locale on earth, after a few days of following the coverage on cnn/bbc/al jazeera/msnbc (if even a few days... how many of us don't keep up with world happenings at all?), we go back to normal. maybe we even made a donation, and probably just a frugal one, even though we just spent a ton of money on something else for our personal entertainment. we go to work, school, gym, supermarket and sleep in real beds at night. we hang out with our friends and family, go out and have fun.

i don't get it. even though i do it.

i was finishing my masters degree and getting ready to graduate during the last "major" world natural disaster (may 2008: cyclones in burma and 7.9 earthquake in sichuan, china.) i was lining up for my diploma as people across the world were lining up for rations and basic care from giant trucks. my parents and i were grazing on a ridiculous spread catered by B.U. while people across the world were picking food from garbage, looting stores, or chewing on those "high energy biscuits" that are distributed after something like this. i got to put on ridiculous-looking academic regalia and snap proud fotos with my parents while other people were hastily dressing their dead relatives for a respectful burial. i started paying a ridiculous amount of money for a degree, money that could have rebuilt a few of their lost homes.

this time around i live in a posh apartment in a relatively safe part of the city. i have a job. i have fun friends. i got to go home for the holidays, see my family, and got a green pair of all-stars. i definitely have everything i need, and even everyting i want (with the exception of decent ethnic food.)

i have these things. they don't. and how is it that i'm only watching their lives unfold in an electronic box for a few days and then i'm allowed to go back to normal?

my most favored professor in grad school talked a lot about the notion of Luck: nothing we did gave us our position in life, but rather, we just got lucky (unless, of course, you believe in karma.) i could easily have been born as a member of the lowest caste, or become an aids orphan at three, or lost my only child in an earthquake b/c my corrupt government skimped on building materials for neighborhood schools. but i am not any of those things, and nothing i did helped me avoid any of those fates. (and, as he said (very paraphrased), "brad pitt never did anything to make himself look naturally hot.")

i am reminded of this notion of Luck whenever i travel through this beautiful country, and in any developing place. i easily could have been born here in one of the poorest countries in the world, in the countryside, trying to make a living by selling tortillas and pseudo-authentic handicrafts to strange-looking tourists with giant backpacks that could fit all of my earthly posessions. but i wasn't, but rather, i Am that strange-looking tourist with a giant backpack that can fit their family's earthly belongings.

i get teased sometimes about being a Debbie Downer, but i don't care really. i think, read, watch and talk about these things because i have to remind myself about who i am, what i have, and more importantly, i need to remember all those things i am not.